Sir Cliff Richard was awarded £1m in damages over BBC coverage of a police raid on his home

He said: “ The world has changed, even if judges haven’t noticed. In the cacophony of social media everything is everywhere anyway, suspects would be named almost instantly, however much you bind the steam-age media limping along behind.

“The line between privacy and freedom is one of the most important decisions a civilised society has to make. It’s time it was drawn by parliament and not left to be worked out piecemeal by judges on the basis of individual cases.”

Buerk, who shot to fame with his reports from Ethiopia’s famine in 1984, he said he was pleased the BBC had reported the raid at Sir Cliff’s house because it showed “the juices were still flowing.”

He said: “Journalism is not the priesthood, even at the BBC. I’m pleased that the juices are still flowing at an organisation that can often look flatulent, bureaucratic and complacent. Great that the newsroom can still “go bananas” over a “cracking story” – even if it wasn’t.”

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He also questioned whether police should spend so much time investigating when there was a knife, gun and violent crime epidemic. He said: “They’ve got better things to do.”

The BBC has agreed to pay Sir Cliff Richard £850,000 towards his legal costs within 14 days, following his privacy case against the corporation. A judge ruled the BBC infringed the singer’s privacy in its reporting of a police raid on his home in 2014, awarding him £210,000 in damages. Sir Cliff was never arrested or charged as part of the investigation.